Notch on Euclideon: It's a scam | Hacker News Reader

Notch on Euclideon: It's a scam

notch.tumblr.com

115 pointsDysiode48 comments

The use of the word "scam" is really inaccurate based on the rest of the post. He agrees that the demo is real, and calls it a scam since others are working on similar things and they are trying to get funding. Neither others working on the same thing nor trying to get funding make something a scam. It would be a scam if they weren't really rendering what they say they are in real time, but Notch doesn't claim that.

He calls it a scam because they're making hyperbolic claims, very carefully ignoring any mention of any of the drawbacks to this technology, and pretending that it's all brand new technology when it's actually been done before. And they're doing this to make money via investors.

It would be _fake_ if they weren't rendering it in real time. He didn't call it fake. He called it a scam.

The ridiculous used car salesman type pitch in the demo videos certainly doesn't help. They're made with the same sort of breathless breath-through narrative you hear in free energy and perpetual motion machine demos.

How do we know it has been done before? All I've seen so far are people guessing how it might be done--and then analyzing their own guesses to find they are inadequate, and then somehow concluding that means that nobody could do it.

Also remember that english is not his native language, so his understanding of the word may differ from yours.

I am blown away by the number of people on HN and elsewhere who are posting about "how they must be doing it" and then calling it unimpressive or a technical dead end.

Reading the blog post, I now know how Notch would approach building such a thing, and that he thinks his approach wouldn't really work. I still have no idea how Euclidean's implementation actually works and neither does anyone else who I've seen comment on their demo video.

If Euclideon wants us to believe they've invented something unique and ground breaking then the onus is on them to at least show us something that can't already be done with existing technology, if not explain how it works.

The reddit thread http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/j6sr1/a_simple_and_e... has a bunch of good comments that outline why Notch isn't really in a position to post stuff like this.

Anyone who's watched that demo has noticed exactly what he said, that their demo is basically a 2D tilemap of a few repeated 3D objects, most likely to make the memory requirements of storing voxels at that level of detail feasible.

If I recall in the demo, they kept on referring to procedural generation, and so perhaps they have a few tricks up their sleeve for generating content (trees being an obvious example) that would be varied yet take up little memory.

Procedurally generated assets take very little storage. They still take just as much memory to actually put into the scene graph and render.

Not if your assets are functional, such as a procedurally generated heightmap. Then they take up next to no memory.

But you can't do that efficiently for a tree, I think.

Not with ray casting of sparse voxel octrees, which is probably what they're doing. Depending on how the procedural generation work, you only need to generate that which you render.

I think the unlimited detail refers to rendering speed, not memory requirements. The data has to be redundant to fit in memory. He also claims it runs on a laptop without GPU. So it can't be just octree or any other regular acceleration structure. So if it isn't scam, it's something new.

From the author (old post on Beyond3D): "firstly the system isn’t ray tracing at all or anything like ray tracing. Ray tracing uses up lots of nasty multiplication and divide operators and so isn’t very fast or friendly. Unlimited Detail is a sorting algorithm that retrieves only the 3d atoms (I wont say voxels any more it seems that word doesn’t have the prestige in the games industry that it enjoys in medicine and the sciences) that are needed, exactly one for each pixel on the screen, it displays them using a very different procedure from individual 3d to 2d conversion, instead we use a mass 3d to 2d conversion that shares the common elements of the 2d positions of all the dots combined. And so we get lots of geometry and lots of speed, speed isn’t fantastic yet compared to hardware, but its very good for a software application that’s not written for dual core. We get about 24-30 fps 1024*768 for that demo of the pyramids of monsters. The media is hyping up the death of polygons but really that’s just not practical, this will probably be released as “backgrounds only” for the next few years, until we have made a lot more tools to work with."

I'm fairly certain that "sorting to find the one atom for each pixel on the screen" is exactly the definition of raytracing.

Any number of techniques fit this same definition, raymarching being the obvious one. It's too vague to actually mean anything.

I agree with what I think your unstated point is (namely this is basically raytracing). I think the detail here is that this is essentially a sorting/data-organisational solution rather than a geometrically calculated solution. Ray tracing generally takes into account more than one atom (often at complex geometric angles to the directly visible surface) to create a pixel. This claims not to (but to look really good I would have thought it will eventually have to).

So yes. This is a kind of raytracing but I think that the implementation is radically different to the commonly used raytracing implementaions.

The guy behind Atomontage has stated that he's got his engine averaging less than one bit per voxel (he estimates 753 bits or less per 1000 voxels)[1] by applying a variety of compression mechanisms[2], so at least that part of Notch's assessment can be disregarded out of hand.

EDIT: Taking a step back, remember that with an octree, contiguous areas require less tree depth to fully describe them, so open empty space (sky) and consistently filled space (uniform material underground) require much less data. This of course creates practical limitations in addition to the claimed maximums of what the engine can achieve (so art budgets aren't going anywhere anytime soon) but I think calling it a "scam" is a bit much.

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sfWYUgxGBE

[2] http://www.atomontage.com/?id=tech_overv

Fine. Assume it's one bit per voxel.

512 petabits = 2 petabytes.

So only 2 petabytes of data. I'd like to see the server that processed those 2 petabytes.

Notch also points out that even still, 8m is quite a small height. Take it to 16m and now you need 4 petabytes of space.

Nope, more like 2 petabytes plus 1 bit. Because almost all of that new top 8m is the same atom (empty air), if they are using an octree to store the voxels, then it would take 1 extra bit to store an empty top 8m. Obviously if there are things in the top 8m, it will take more space, but only for the things that are there.

Why is the product considered worthless if it can't do animation yet? The demo clearly walked through examples of inanimate artifacts that are currently rendered as bitmaps on big polygons that could be greatly improved, today, by the technology in the demo. Backgrounds, cityscapes in the distance, the trunk of a tree, etc.

The argument that it's a scam if it can't render grass blowing in the wind is ridiculous.

Because they are claiming an increase of detail by a factor of 100,000, while the demo barely showed anything close to a detail increase by a factor of 1.

Trees & rocks are often animated in modern games, so animation is important. Additionally there is no point using a heavy duty voxel engine to render background landscapes that no one will visit in the game, especially if it's going to take gobs of RAM & CPU time to do it.

Hardware tessellation can already greatly increase surface detail, is already available in modern hardware & has better looking demos.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4G9anRoYGko

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gT_45RFFTx8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0HWZKGZcKoA

The big unanswered question here is can they dynamically sort their data in real time?

If they cannot they can never have movement through the environment - something that they have failed to demonstrate so far.

Dynamic animation is a similar problem but can be solved using key-frame point data (although this could severely limit the fluidity of animation and greatly increase memory usage). You cannot do this smoothly for movement (without using tiles or a combination of tiles and key-frames).

There are many cool games that could be made despite these limitations but Euclideon is promising more than this: their comparisons are with modern FPS's.

I really hope that they have solved all these issues. But if they have, why aren't they demonstrating them?

If they haven't I hope they are being more honest with their investors than they are with the general public.

Am I the only one that agrees with Notch and does think that this "unlimited detail" technology is a scam?

Euclideon is asking for money to develop "new" technology that in reality has been done before and does not have any advantages over a polygon based engine. Everything in their demos can be done (if not better) using a polygon based engine and modern GPUs.

Seriously, just watching one of the videos by Euclideon makes me feel like I'm watching late night tv advertisments. If their tech is as "ground breaking" as they claim, surely they wouldn't need to do as much convincing as they currently do in their videos.

First they say it's crazy. Then they say it's impossible. Then they say it's obvious.

If Notch wants to be picky about ethics, let's talk about spending money hiring for the development of a new game (Scrolls) before finishing a game players have essentially advanced him money to complete (Minecraft). Or about sitting on critical security holes for months. Euclideon may not deliver on its promises (it probably won't), but for all Notch knows they do have a novel technique and labeling it a "scam" is just irresponsible.

An aside, but since you bring it up: if Minecraft was never out of Beta, I would still consider my money well spent, thank you very much. And, he does continue to work on it. He has a team now and they're all working on various things.

I don't care whether you are happy with it or not. It is a poorly written product with many problems. There is a zero-day exploit in SMP allowing people to take over servers that they haven't bothered fixing in the months they've known about it, for example. So what if they are paying lip service to Minecraft development?

If I was paying a subscription fee to play, I would agree with you. But I spent $15 a year and a half ago for the product /as it was/ and it was absolutely worth it. You are not entitled to updates, they're just nice to have.

And I'm not paying for server support or anything, so I don't necessarily expect rapid bug/exploit fixes.

Notch made specific promises that have been broken. And as far as what I am "entitled to", Mojang are in violation of their own Terms of Service by not providing me with a download of the version as-is when I paid for it. So what am I entitled to for my $15? Look, I understand some people are happy to throw away $15 and have Mojang do whatever they want. I think they have an ethical problem when they make promises but don't deliver upon them (such as SMP being ready before Beta), and furthermore generally treat their users with contempt.

I regularly pay my ISP large amounts of money to treat me with contempt. Somebody I'm not paying can treat me however they like. They have /zero obligation/ to be nice to me after I purchase an "as is" product.

"by not providing me with a download of the version as-is when I paid for it."

... so you don't want automatic updates and game improvements, then?

And he's incrementally delivering on his product. He continues to work on it, adventure mode is on its way out. Rumor: he's also working on new worlds, like that sky mode thing. He does continue to work on it, he's not broken his promise. I don't understand what you're talking about.

Minecraft doesn't need money to be finished, it needs time. Hiring completely different developers to work on a different game will not affect the development time of Minecraft so I don't see how that is unethical.

The security holes is definitely an issue but that doesn't make Notch's criticism any less valid.

If I send you money to work on project A, and you invest that money on into some other project B while paying lip service to project A then yes, I would say you have a bit of an ethical problem.

Notch's criticism is hypocritical, and invalid on the grounds that he doesn't have enough information to say that the project is a "scam".

You're framing the relationship between customer and game developer differently than I've ever seen it. When I give a developer money for a game, I'm not "sending him money to work on project A". I'm paying him for the game.

In bold print right on the Minecraft purchase page:

"Please note that when you buy the game, you're paying for the game as it is right now!"

Anyone who buys Minecraft under the delusion that they're contracting Notch to build them a game is, well, delusional.

There are only two contexts -- that I can think of off hand -- in which you pay someone to perform a specific task:

* Contract employment

* Hired staff

Any time you pay a company for a product, you're doing just that. You pay for the product, and the seller gets to do what they want with the profits.

This might be a tenable position, except according to this interpretation of the Terms of Purchase they have not fulfilled their end of the bargain, since they do not provide me with a link to download the version of the game that was released at the time of purchase. This is really just a clumsy attempt at removing liability, not a reflection of reasonable expectations. Notch actively cultivates the expectation of continued and active support.

When you make your purchase you are given the ability to download the version of the game as is, fulfilling the contract. Until you point to something that specifically would force them to maintain the link beyond that your entire position is untenable. That they maintain a link to the most recent version in addition to having provided you with the promised version upon purchase is purely a bonus.

I guess it boils down to whether we think it's "lip service" to start work on a new concurrent project before the initial project is complete. As a freelancer, I work on many projects at once -- am I being unethical by dividing my day to several tasks in parallel instead of performing them completely serially on a first-come, first-served basis? I don't see that there's any neglect inherent in using some resources to explore avenues not directly related to the game. Is it also unethical if notch buys a luxurious replacement for something that he had previously owned which was adequate but not luxurious? Is this also a waste of the "advance" given by players?

While notch intimates that there will one day be a "final" version of minecraft, the only way that effects any minecraft owners is that they received a discount from the theoretical "final" phase because they purchased during testing. There is no contract or implication that final is going to be released no matter what, no refund available to users who don't receive a 1.0 as soon as they'd like.

I think it's silly to consider that an ethical violation. People who buy minecraft buy to play as it is, NOT to play at some hypothetical future state. It is not an advance where we receive a half-finish product with the promise of a finished product by x date.

"People who buy minecraft buy to play as it is, NOT to play at some hypothetical future state"

Evidence?

http://www.minecraft.net/prepurchase.jsp <-- right there.

Nobody has advanced Notch any money. To claim that is disingenuous.

"Please note that when you buy the game, you're paying for the game as it is right now! You will also get the full version of Minecraft when it is released. Read the copyright information for more information on your purchase."

http://www.minecraft.net/prepurchase.jsp

It sounds like you misunderstood what you were spending your money on.

It looks like Mojang don't actually provide you with a download for the game as it is when you pay for it. So they are in violation of their own Terms of Service. Of course, the ToS is just a clumsy attempt to absolve them of liability, and does not reflect the impression they have actively cultivated on the Internet. If you are going to apply a legalistic standard to Notch you should also apply that standard to Euclideon, in which case Notch is not justified in calling it a "scam".

Here you go: http://www.minecraft.net/download.jsp

Download away!

Man, entitled gamers are the worst.

Nope. If I buy the game, and then download it a week or two later I do not necessarily get the correct version. Furthermore, any reasonable person expects that if you are truly only purchasing some specific version then you would be able to download it into the future. You can't have it both ways.

You clearly don’t know what you are talking about. If you want the version of the game when you buy it, it is clearly your own responsibility to download the game. There is no violation of the TOS, to claim otherwise is absurd to the highest degree.

The guy you're responding to clearly created a new account here just to troll.

The contents of that page were changed without notice some time ago. The part you quoted was included later:

http://web.archive.org/web/20090615065558/http://www.minecra...

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